


Episode 16: On the Head of a Pin

by inkandpaperqwerty



Series: Bright Smiles and Bloody Lips [16]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Aftermath of emotional abuse, Bobby Singer to the Rescue, Episode: s04e16 On the Head of a Pin, Family Feels, Feels, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Ghost John Winchester, Insecurity, John Winchester Tries, Liam Bailey Winchester Does Not Like Angels, Liam Bailey Winchester Doing His Best, Liam Bailey Winchester is So Done, Musicals, Protective Bobby Singer, References to John's Past, References to Suicide, References to bullying, Season/Series 04, Self-Esteem Issues, Street smarts, Survival, so many musicals
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-02
Updated: 2019-05-02
Packaged: 2020-02-15 22:44:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18678832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inkandpaperqwerty/pseuds/inkandpaperqwerty
Summary: "Dean expected Sam to find a way to cope after he was dragged to Hell. By no means did he, even for a moment, think Sam might look to parenting as a coping mechanism."Castiel got Liam out of the greenroom and took him to a cabin, far away from any angels who might want to harm him. Which, that's great and all, and Liam's not trying to be needy or demanding, but... it's also far away from food, water, and family.So, armed with a blanket-poncho and the ghost of John Winchester, Liam sets out to find his way back home.To the tune of his favorite musical numbers, of course.





	Episode 16: On the Head of a Pin

Liam grabbed the blanket he had rolled and tied with his belt, slinging it over his shoulder and walking to the cabin door. He took a deep breath and opened it, peering out at the woods for a moment before taking another look at the cabin. He was leaving it exactly like he found it, except for the blanket he was taking with him. He figured that was the polite thing to do.

Liam sighed and looked down at his arm, where he had scratched the angel-banishing sigil so he wouldn’t forget what it looked like. There was nothing else in the cabin he could find that looked like it would do anything to protect him, so… with a sun in the sky and no food or water to be found… it was time to go.

“I can do this.” Liam pulled his blanket a little higher on his back and stepped onto the dirt, pulling the cabin door shut behind him. He grabbed his earbuds from where they dangled over the collar of his shirt and put them in one at a time. “Here we go.”

Liam hit play and started to walk.

* * *

Liam jumped up on a stump and threw his fists in the air. “No one can break us, no one can make us, quit befooore we’re dooone!” He jumped off and continued walking—prancing, really, if he were honest—through the pathless forest in search of civilization. “One for all and all for, one for all and all for, one for all and aaaaaall—for one!”

He stopped for a moment and looked upward, shielding his face with his arm to keep out both the noonday sun and whatever decided to fall from the trees when he tilted his head back. Thankfully, nothing actually fell in his eyes, and after a moment, he turned around to look behind him. He wished he had something to leave a trail with, and he had been trying to mark occasional spots with piles of rocks, but he wasn’t sure how much good that was going to do him. There were rocks everywhere, after all.

Liam turned back around and jumped onto the non-existent path he had been following, picking up in the middle of the song playing through his earbuds. “Ha-lay-loo! Now me and Mr. Wrong are through. I’ll find myself another beau, who I know, is no roooveeer!”

* * *

“One short day, in the em-er-ald city, one short day, for a lifetime of fuuun! Every way—ay!” Liam jumped away from the sudden appearance of someone next to him, and it took both arms and all his concentration to keep from losing his balance on the rocky terrain. “Mr. Winchester! Don’t scare me like that!”

Mr. Winchester smirked just a little, and then cast a questioning look around the area. It looked like, at least for the time being, words weren’t going to make it across the gap between the dead and the living.

Liam sighed loudly and took half a second to catch his breath, pointing out in front of him. “I can’t tell for sure, but every now and then I hear highway noises—you know, like big trucks—and I think they’re coming from that direction.”

Mr. Winchester nodded a few times, his own gaze wandering up to look at the layout of the forest ahead. He opened his mouth, turning back to Liam, and then he flickered away like a broken hologram.

Liam huffed in frustration and almost started walking again, but then Mr. Winchester was back, looking a little more solid than before. Since he had tried to talk before disappearing, Liam took an earbud out, just in case.

“I think I might actually be getting the hang of this.” Mr. Winchester looked down at his hands, clenching and unclenching his fists a few times. “I did some looking around while I was stuck on the other side, and you’re headed in the right direction. I tried to leave some markers, but… I’m still working out how to touch things.” He flexed his hands again, a concentrated crease in his brow, and then he looked back at Liam. “And don’t call me Mr. Winchester. That makes me sound old. Just call me John.”

Liam tilted his head but then shrugged. “If that’s what you want.”

“It is.” Mr. Winch— _John_ gestured to the woods ahead of them. “You should keep walking. You don’t want to be out here after the sun goes down.” He nodded toward the blanket rolled up on Liam’s back. “Even with that, it might get too cold. Best to keep moving.”

Liam nodded affirmatively and started hiking again, stepping up on a large log and half jumping, half dropping down on the other side. John just went through it.

“So… from all the talking out loud you do… I gathered that Sam and Dean are still hunting.” John frowned slightly. “That true?”

Liam pulled his lips between his teeth and nodded, wondering if that was the right answer.

Mr. Winchest— _John_ offered a nod of his own, looking grim.

Liam looked at the ground to watch his steps, and after a few moments of silence, he spoke. “Were they… not supposed to?”

John let out a heavy sigh, and when Liam looked up, there was a sad and bitter sort of smile on his face. “Last time I saw them, they killed the thing that had been chasing us since Sammy was a baby. I just thought… without Yellow Eyes around… they would finally be able to settle down.”

“Oh.” Liam nodded in understanding and looked down at his feet again, just in time to keep himself from tripping on a tree root.

“Though it sounds like they settled down at least a little.” There was a smile in John’s voice when he spoke. “They’ve got you.” Then, after a pause, “How did that happen?”

Liam shrugged his shoulders. “Um, the kids at my group home were getting sick one by one. They said it was some kind of pneumonia… but then the kids would fall asleep and not wake up. Comas at first, but then a couple died.”

“Shtriga,” John supplied.

Liam nodded, assuming John was right. Liam had never bothered to ask Sam what attacked him that night; he never asked Sam any questions about that night. He never talked about it, afraid if Sam contemplated the incident for too long, Sam would start wishing the shtriga had finished the job. Sam would start wishing he had never gone back to get Liam.

John did not carry that same risk. So, Liam went on.

“Right, that. I guess I was next on the list… or whatever, because it came after me. Sorzie saved me.” Liam glanced over. “It’s a nickname. And a long story.”

John pursed his lips and gave a sideways sort of nod, apparently willing to let it go for the time being.

So, once again, Liam continued. “He killed it, and… he went away at first. I didn’t want him to, but he said he had to. But then he came back for me.” Liam slowly shook his head. “I don’t know why he did that. I—”

Liam stumbled over a protruding rock with a startled yelp and hit his hands and knees, the branches and stones scraping up his skin on impact. He quickly pulled his hands off the ground, leaning back on his heels and blowing on his palms.

“You alright?”

Liam nodded, not bothering to look up, and with a quiet hiss of pain, he pushed himself back to his feet. He dusted himself off, sniffed a little—because the pain had made his eyes water just the _tiniest_ bit—and started walking again. “I’m just clumsy. Sorry.”

John didn’t say anything for a moment, and when he recovered his voice, he moved the conversation back to Liam’s story. “Where was Dean during all this?”

Liam pressed his lips together for a moment, getting a sick feeling in his stomach just thinking about Dean being trapped in the horrible place Castiel had described.

“Um…” Liam shook his head, dragging his sleeve over his eyes. “Um, well… Dean was sorta… in Hell.”

“What?” John’s voice was completely flat. There was no shock, or anger, or confusion. He just sort of… reacted, like maybe he didn’t quite believe it yet. Like he couldn’t quite get his head around it.

“Dean was… in Hell.” Liam kicked a wayward stone, glancing up long enough to look ahead and try to spot the highway. He saw nothing but trees and sky. “Um, I overheard them talking about it… and I was there during a fight between them and the angels, and they talked about it then, too. I wasn’t really supposed to know, so… I don’t know how he got there or how long he was there or anything… I just know it happened… and I know the angels got Dean out a couple months after Sam let me run away with him.”

John didn’t say anything, and Liam was honestly too afraid to look over and see what was on his face. Liam just kept his eyes either ahead of him or on the ground, and he briefly returned his attention to the song still streaming through one of his headphones.

_“Siiingin’ in the rain, just siiingin’ in the rain; what a glooorious feeling, I’m happy again! I’m laughing at clouds, so daaark up above, the sun’s in my heart, and I’m ready for love…”_

“So… Dean’s back now? He’s… he’s topside?”

Liam chanced a look in John’s direction and found a man looking guilty more than anything. Like it was his fault Dean went to Hell. Briefly, Liam thought maybe it was; maybe that was why neither Dean nor Sam liked to talk about their dad.

But Liam didn’t know for sure, so he offered a small smile and a nod. “Yeah, Dean’s back. He… didn’t really like me at first, but it got better when I colored a picture for him.”

John frowned, confused. “Dean’s always loved kids. You sure he wasn’t just in a mood or sick or something?”

Liam nodded. “Yeah, I’m sure. Sorzie said he got mad because we scared him. Like… he wasn’t expecting me, and it made him feel or think something he didn’t like, so he sort of just… reacted.” Liam shrugged his shoulders, and it didn’t look like John really understood, but Liam didn’t feel the inclination to explain. “But he warmed up to me real quick. He likes to color with me, and he teaches me things about Baby, and he took me to an amusement park that was really fun!” Liam smiled up at John. “I like Dean.” His smile began to fade almost immediately, his gaze traveling down to the dirt as a sharp pain hit his sternum. “I miss Dean. I miss them both. And I miss Bobby. I even miss Castiel.”

John flickered briefly, and Liam knew that meant they were running out of time, but John didn’t pay it any mind. Instead, he offered a very faint smile and said, “You’re almost back to them. We’ll get you home, don’t worry.”

Liam flashed a little smile of his own, but it didn’t last.

John slipped his hands into his pockets. Briefly, Liam wondered how that worked when one was a ghost, but he didn’t ask.

“Tell me about the amusement park,” John said.

Liam perked up a bit, brightening at the memories that filtered through his mind. “We went to Knoebels! We rode _so_ many rides, and we went on _all_ the rollercoasters, and when we went on the Tilt-A-Whirl, Sorzie and Dee knew just when to lean to make it spin so fast we couldn’t even scream, we were just laughing and trying to catch our breath, and _then_ —”

Liam talked long after John flickered out of sight. 

* * *

Once Liam found the highway, he quickly decided that carrying a rolled-up blanket would require more explanations than he was willing to come up with. So, using a piece of broken headlight he found on the side of the road, he cut a hole large enough to put his head through, and his dark gray blanket became a dark gray poncho.

Getting a ride on the highway was fairly easy. Liam hitchhiked for no more than thirty minutes before a nice lady in a minivan—Elaine, she said her name was—pulled over and offered to help. Given that she was a woman _and_ in a minivan _and_ had a baby in the backseat, Liam decided it was worth the risk to get in her vehicle.

Liam told Elaine that he had gotten mad at his parents and run away, but that he had calmed down and needed to get back home. He said he didn’t have their phone numbers memorized—which was believable, thanks to cellphones—and then said his parents had taken his phone away, which was why he got mad in the first place. He asked her to take him to the closest bus stop for the local line—local lines were more likely to take an unaccompanied minor—so he could ride it home.

_“I’ve run away before, but I’ve never run this far. They’re expecting me to come back, like I normally do, and if they get home from work and I’m not there, they’ll be freaking out wondering where I am. Then I’ll never get my phone back! Not to mention, I’d be grounded for life.”_

Elaine agreed that it was best to get Liam home as soon as possible, and she saw no reason to call the cops if Liam was certain his parents weren’t already looking for him or filing reports. Elaine was, however, hesitant to let Liam make the bus trip alone. So, Liam told her he was fourteen—there was something about being in high school that made grownups more willing to walk away—and that he had ridden the bus a million times to get to the library and the park and so on. It took a little bit to convince her, especially because he was small for fourteen, but he wasn’t _impossibly_ small, so he won her over in the end.

Elaine put him on the bus and paid the flat-rate fare, which made Liam feel a bit bad, because he had already swiped a twenty from her wallet. But Liam only thanked her, waving through the window with an award-winning smile as the bus pulled away from the curb. He rode as far as he could, and then he started walking again, intending to repeat the process from town to town until he found his way home.

But then he found something. Something old and mostly forgotten and _wonderful._

All he needed was a few quarters.

“Hi.” Liam put a bottle of Gatorade and a bag of beef jerky on the counter, holding out the folded twenty between two fingers. “Don’t really care how you make change as long as I get some quarters.”

She didn’t try to make conversation, which Liam expected had something to do with her natural disposition as well as the headphones he refused to take out. She was middle-aged and grumpy, so she probably expected a teenager to be disrespectful. And Liam wanted to keep up the teenager façade just in case the woman had worked in the same place long enough to know the local kids. When kids were out of place, people got involved; when teenagers were out of place, people generally avoided them.

He was actually feeling pretty optimistic when he left the store, but it didn’t last. Halfway through the parking lot, he saw something that made his heart drop into his stomach, and his mood quickly followed it down.

It was a bumper sticker about abortion. Pro-Choice. He couldn’t remember what side that was, but it didn’t really matter. He didn’t like any talk about abortion, period, because it always reminded him of Timmy. And when he thought about Timmy…

Liam ducked his head and held his food and drink close, rushing through the rest of the parking lot. He walked down the street toward the payphone, taking his headphones out in preparation to make his call, but the closer he got, the worse he felt.

_What if they don’t want me? I caused so many problems for them… and for Castiel. They had to do what the angels said because of me. Castiel got hurt because of me. Maybe… maybe it would be better if I were gone._

“Are you gonna stare at it all day, or are you gonna make a call?”

Liam startled slightly, but it took him a moment to tear his gaze away from the phone and look at John, who was standing in a nearby alley.

John had his arms folded over his chest, and he looked impatient. Unhappy.

Liam looked back at the phone for a moment, and then he shuffled toward the alley. He went past John and fell back against the wall, sliding down the bricks until he was sitting on the ground.

“Hey.” John nudged Liam with his foot. “What’s the matter?”

Liam wrapped his arms around his knees and buried his face in them, tears burning the backs of his eyes.

“Come on, now. Buck up and stop crying.” There was a shuffling noise, and then John was sitting next to Liam on the ground. “Tell me what the problem is.”

Liam lifted his head and rested his chin on his arms, sniffing quietly as tears blurred the brick wall across the alley. “Back at the group home… there was a boy named Timmy.” He dragged his arm over his eyes and sniffed again. “He was really nice to me, even though he was a couple years older. We were… we were friends.” They were _best_ friends. “And he used to talk sometimes… about how his mom said she wished she had aborted him… or that she had miscarried…” Liam’s eyes started to burn again, the tears coming back in a rush. “And some of the other boys at the group home… they used to say the most awful things to him. They would make jokes about…” his face twisted up, “…about coat hangers, and I didn’t get them, but Timmy did, and they made him cry, and sometimes he would cut his arms or legs, and...” Liam opened his mouth and then stopped.

John kept quiet, letting Liam find his words in his own time.

Liam half wished John would interrupt so he didn’t have to finish the story.

“He…” Liam sniffed and wiped hi face again. “He went on a home pass one weekend… and I don’t know what happened, but… he went up to the roof… and he jumped.” He opened his mouth to continue, stopped, and then slowly started again, choking up. “And I thought… I thought those boys would feel bad, but they… they didn’t, they just laughed. And Mrs. Highland made us go to school that day, and we still had to do chores, and… and everyone just _moved_ _on_. Like they didn’t miss him.” Liam hiccupped and wiped his eyes. “But I missed him. I missed him _so much_.”

Liam still missed Timmy, he just never let himself talk about it. He never let himself _think_ about it. Even his therapist had been unable to get him to ‘process his trauma,’ and Sam didn’t know Timmy ever existed. Sam could only guess what caused the nightmares on those occasions when Liam refused to give details. Liam had completely shut off that part of his brain, suppressing any and all thoughts of Timmy until Timmy was all but forgotten. And it felt wrong, but it also felt like the only way to survive.

Until something forced him to remember. Old, metal coat hangers, like the ones the boys would leave on Timmy’s bed. People named Timmy or Tim. Mentions of abortion in any capacity. Mentions of miscarriage; sometimes pregnancy alone was enough to trigger him. Reserved parking spaces for expecting mothers, women who were visibly pregnant or talking about being pregnant, even the word maternity. Sometimes it was a brief twist in his gut that passed in seconds, and sometimes it knocked him flat on his back and sucked the air out of his lungs.

Sam still didn’t know why Liam had cried hysterically for twenty-two minutes straight after watching some kids drop a water balloon from third-story window.

“What’s this got to do with making a phone call?”

Liam sniffed, and his instincts said to be angry. Wasn’t he allowed to be upset just because? Sam said he was. Didn’t the story bother John at all? It would have bothered Sam. Sam would have known what to do and say. Sam would have made everything better.

_I want Sam!_

But Liam’s frustration quickly faded, replaced by fear. Because the reason he wanted to focus on Timmy was so his train of thought wouldn’t make it to the next station stop. Usually, telling a tragic story got grownups to offer comfort and zero in on the perceived trauma. Most grownups didn’t force Liam to go back to his trigger.

“I just…” Liam curled up a little tighter, tears escaping his eyes and rolling down his cheeks. “Nobody missed Timmy… and…” he dragged his arm over his eyes, “…and his mom wished he had never been born… and _my_ mom…” Liam looked out at the payphone for a second, but he got too close to seeing John’s face and looked at his knees again, watching his tears make little dark spots on the blanket-poncho. “I’m difficult. I’ve caused problems for… _everyone_. That’s why my mom didn’t want me. And I know the angels kidnapped me so they could make Sam and Dean do what they wanted… and I got Castiel in trouble, and…” Liam screwed his eyes shut, chest tightening as a painful, stabbing sensation struck him in the sternum. “What if Sam doesn’t want me anymore? Maybe he would be happier if I just…” His eyes flickered up to the top of the building across from them. “Why would Sam want a mess like me?”

Silence settled in the alley, Liam’s shoulders shaking as he sobbed soundlessly. His chest and stomach hurt, and as desperate as he was to go home, he was terrified of making that phone call. Even if Sam didn’t come out and say he wanted Liam to stay away, he could still sigh in that annoyed, unhappy way that said he was getting _really_ tired of Liam’s neediness. Even if Sam and Dean drove halfway across the country to pick Liam up, they could still refuse to talk to him—or even look at him—until they felt he had been appropriately punished for causing so much trouble.

There was so much they could do without saying they didn’t want him. There was _so much_. And all of it hurt. And maybe Liam could survive Dean or Bobby giving him those looks, but he knew he couldn’t survive Sam doing the same.

“Sam isn’t the type to settle for something he doesn’t want.” John’s voice was low and gruff, but there was a certain warmth to it Liam couldn’t quite describe. “If Sam says he wants you around, you can bet your bottom dollar he means it.” He paused. “You said the angels used you as leverage?”

Liam felt a swell of guilt and nodded his head, hiding his face in his arms.

“You wouldn’t have made very good leverage if you didn’t mean the world to Sam and Dean. They’ve had to walk away from a lot of people and sacrifice a lot of things to get the job done. But they weren’t willing to give you up.” John nodded in the general direction of the payphone. “I guarantee, they’re waiting for that phone call. Hoping for it. Praying for it.”

Liam looked up at John for a long moment, tears rolling down his cheeks. “Even after all the trouble I caused?”

“I don’t know what trouble you think you caused, but I doubt it’s as bad as you think it is.” John laughed then, tilting his head back to lean against the bricks. “Even if it is, those boys are attracted to trouble like magnets to iron. If you didn’t cause trouble, they would probably think you were boring.”

Liam laughed a little, reaching up to scrub his eyes. “Really?”

“Trouble is their middle name,” John replied with a wry grin.

Liam smiled a little and looked at the payphone, but he felt a twist in his gut as soon as he saw it. _Why would they want you? You’re more than trouble. You’re annoying. You’re stupid. You’re useless. You’re difficult. You’re a failure. You can’t do anything right. You—_

“You know, Sam was gonna be a Liam.”

Liam jumped slightly and looked up at John. “Really?”

John nodded with a small smile. “Yeah. I always thought we’d have another kid or two, so when Mary wanted to name Sam after her father, I didn’t make a fuss. But I wanted a Liam, and it didn’t really work as a middle name for either of the boys.”

Liam screwed his face up, confused. “But why?”

John didn’t say anything for a moment, and then he idly tapped the star on Liam’s chest. “Master Sargent Liam Hall. He got this medal the same time I did. We fought together… He was a good man.” John smiled, but there was a heavy sadness to it. “I had been shot in the leg… and he had been badly burned… but he was a team leader, and that team needed a sniper to cover their advance. So, he did his job, and I did mine.” He shook his head slowly, his eyes growing distant, his voice softer and lower. “We made it back… but the war followed him home. More than it did me.”

Liam listened, expecting to hear a story, but John just shook his head and gave another one of those sad smiles, the thousand-yard stare slowly fading from his features.

“Killed me, losing him.” John’s lips twitched into just a little bit more of a smile. Something a little lighter, a little warmer. “Hate to think what it would do to Sam and Dean if they lost you.”

Liam looked at John for a moment, and then he looked over at the payphone. He slowly got to his feet and approached, digging around in his pockets for the change he had gotten at the convenience store.

He took a deep breath and pulled the phone off the hook, putting it to his ear. He deposited two quarters into the payphone and punched in Sam’s cellphone number, praying it would go through.

_Ring… ring… ring…_

“Hello?”

It was Sam. And that broke a dam Liam hadn’t even realized was there.

“Sam?” Liam sobbed, hot tears rolling down his cheeks.

“Liam? Liam, is that you?” Sam sounded shocked, but he sounded happy.

He sounded _happy._

“Liam? Liam, are you there?”

Liam covered his mouth and dropped his forehead against one of the plastic walls enclosing the payphone. “Sam…” He didn’t know what else to say.

“Liam, where—”

Dean’s voice interrupted in the background, undecipherable and frantic.

“It’s—yeah, Dean, it’s him. It’s—” Sam let out a little laugh. “It’s him. He—I don’t know, I have to ask.” Sam was panting, laughing through his words, and he sounded like he was crying, too. “Liam—Liam, where are you, buddy?”

Liam dropped his hand and sucked down a lungful of air. “I don’t—I don’t know where exactly, but I stopped at a convenience store, and there were bumper stickers for Montana and Yellowstone River.” He rubbed at his eyes. _He’s happy. They’re both happy._

“Okay. Okay, you just hang on, we’re gonna get you. Okay? Dean, who’s closer, us or Bobby? Liam, are you hurt?” Sam was bouncing back and forth between the two almost seamlessly, speaking rapidly, seemingly unable to settle on one voice or emotion. “Are there any angels following you? Are you in danger?”

“No, I—” Liam looked around out of habit, wondering if he had, in fact, been found. “No, I think Castiel did something. I—”

“Castiel?”

“Castiel showed up in my room, and he—” Liam stopped, wetting his lips. In the thrill of talking to Sam, he had forgotten how dire the situation was. “He looked really bad, Sam. He was covered in blood, and he couldn’t stand up right, and—” Liam dragged his arm over his face, trying to clear away the still-happy tears and get focused. “He took me to a cabin, and then he left, and I don’t know what happened to him, but he never came back, so I had to leave the cabin, because there wasn’t any food or water, and—”

“Shh, shh, it’s okay. Take a deep breath.” Sam’s voice crackled out for a moment. “No, Dean, he’s just upset. He’s not—Liam, hold on, I’m gonna put you on speaker phone.”

Liam held his breath and waited, and he tried not to start crying again when the voices began to echo and Dean joined the conversation.

“Hey, Lee. Can you hear me?”

Liam smiled through his tears, holding the phone with both hands. “Yeah, I’m—I can hear you.” He sniffed. “I can hear you guys.”

“Good, good.” Dean sounded like a huge weight had lifted off his shoulders, like he had been worried, like he _cared._ “Yellowstone River is pretty big. Can you tell us if you’re in a city or rural area?”

Liam sniffled again, but the tears kept coming. “Uh, what’s rural?”

“It’s like farms and backwoods,” Dean answered.

Liam looked around, despite already knowing the answer. “No, it’s definitely a city. It’s pretty big, too.” He hoped that was helpful.

“Okay. Good job, buddy, that’s really helpful.” It was like Dean had read Liam’s mind. “Can you see any—”

“Dean Smith?”

Liam tensed up at the new voice. It sounded vaguely familiar, and he didn’t like the way Sam and Dean didn’t immediately respond. They were good liars, and they normally gave _some_ kind of response to bystanders.

“Sam?” That was Dean, and he sounded concerned.

“That’s not the name I gave the hospital,” Sam replied, equally cautious.

 _Hospital?_ Liam thought, chewing on his bottom lip, pulse thrumming in his ears as his elation turned to fear. _Why are they in a hospital?_

“Liam, call Bobby.” That was Sam again.

“Sam?” Liam blinked. “Sam, what’s hap—”

“Call Bobby!”

Click.

Liam held the phone to his ear for another second, listening to the dial tone, and then he pulled it away and stared at it.

John was by his side in an instant. “What happened?”

Liam shook his head, blinking slowly, lost in shock. “I don’t know. They were there, and they were asking me where I was, and then someone called Dean by the wrong name, and Sam said to call Bobby, and… it went dead after that.”

It took a few more moments to process that Sam and Dean had likely been attacked, and if Liam vaguely recognized the voice of their attacker, their attacker was likely an angel. And for a fraction of a second, Liam was scared, but then he was angry.

Liam had _finally_ gotten away from the angels, at great cost to Castiel; he had hiked through a forest, and he had hitched a ride with a stranger, and he had stolen and lied and connived to find a way to contact his family… and the angels had taken them away _again._

And Liam was angry.

Liam slammed the phone down and stormed back to the alley, grabbing his food and drink before starting off down the street, blanket-poncho flapping in the wind.

“Hey!” John tried to grab Liam’s arm, but his body flickered at the last second. “Where do you think you’re going?”

Liam clenched his fists at his sides and snapped back angrily, “First, I’m gonna figure out where I am so I know what to tell Bobby. Then I’m gonna find a place to sleep before the sun goes down, because no matter where in Montana I am, I’m far enough away that it’ll be a long time before Bobby gets here. And then I’m gonna find a library, and I’m gonna check out every book they have on _angels._ ”

For a moment, Liam didn’t hear anything—which Liam didn’t much care about, as long as John didn’t try to stop him—but then John chuckled and muttered something to himself that made Liam swell with pride.

“Yup. Kid’s definitely a Winchester. No doubt about it.”

* * *

Liam almost cried all over again when he saw Bobby pulled up to the curb in a junked car. He scrambled to his feet, blanket-poncho wrapped tightly around himself, and ran toward the street, calling out.

“Bobby!”

Bobby was barely around the front of the car when Liam jumped into his arms, grabbing on tight and burying his face in the flannel shirt and canvas jacket that smelled faintly of whiskey.

“Easy, easy. I got’cha, boy. I got’cha.” Bobby rubbed Liam’s back and pat it a few times, moving back toward the car. “Let’s get you in out of the cold.”

Liam screwed his eyes shut and held on tight, letting Bobby pick him up and carry him to the near-suffocating warmth of the car. He felt his behind touch the backseat and opened his eyes, closing them against almost immediately as his mouth was stretched into a yawn.

“There’s a pillow and some blankets in there.” Bobby’s voice was somehow soft and rough at the same time. “Lie down and get some sleep.”

Liam nodded absently and turned around, crawling toward the other end of the car and grabbing the bedding Bobby had mentioned. He heard the door slam but paid it no mind, wrestling with the blanket for all of two seconds before he decided he didn’t have the energy. He collapsed, cold and damp, half-tangled in one blanket and wearing another, onto the backseat of Bobby’s car.

Liam heaved a sigh and smiled when the car started to move, anxious to be lulled to sleep by the rhythmic rumbling underneath him.

“You alright, Lee?”

Was he alright? Well, he had spent an amount of time he couldn’t define being held captive by angels who confused, frightened, and misunderstood him; he had been stranded in a forest with no food or water, left to find his way back to civilization on his own; he had suffered the whiplash of finally hearing Sam’s voice only to have Sam taken away again in a matter of minutes; and, as if all that wasn’t enough, he hadn’t been doing that great to begin with.

Even before the angels took him, he had needed an amulet to keep the nightmares away, and it didn’t always work; he had often skipped meals or ate very little due to the random stomachaches he had suffered from for as long as he could remember; he had feared Dean’s temper, feared the sudden and unknowable people Sam had brought into his life, feared Sam would leave him for Dean.

He had feared he would never be good enough. He still feared that.

But, for the moment, he was safe. He was safe, and he was warm, and there was a country music station playing softly in the background as rain began to beat on the windows. He was safe. He was with family. He was going home.

“I’m great, Bobby.” Liam smiled. “I’m really, really great.”

**Author's Note:**

> Wow! I got an amazing response on the last story. I was blown away by how many people said they wanted to see this continue into Season 5! So, I've decided to go the extended route. Timmy (and other repressed traumas) will make more appearances in Season 5, as well as some more stories about Liam's time in the system. Thanks again for all the wonderful feedback! 
> 
> Props to anyone who can name all the musicals references in this episode. ;)


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